The Portuguese word that’s associated with fado is saudade, one of those more-or-less untranslatable words that means – inexactly – something like “longing,” an emotion that resonates through cultures where people have migrated through choice or through necessity.

“There is no first person, and no direct speech. You realise as a reader, slowly, that the sort of person who uses the phrase “Pereira maintains” may not be completely believing of Pereira’s account of events.”